The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1887-09-24
A MODERN HERO.
BY MARGARET E. sANGsTER.

suppose that most boys, il asked off,
hand for the names of heroes, would
turn to their histories and make a list of
great soldiers and conquerors. But not
all the heroes have been men Of war.
James Harrington was born Septem
Der 3, 1847, in the pretty little village of
Hurst Pierpont, Sussex, England. There
are people living in Hurst who will tell
you still of the prattling child who tod
died everywhere on sturdy feet, showing
while almost baby desire to see what
ever the big, strange world about him
had for child's delight. There was no
nook in the grounds, from the holly bush
where the blackbird had swung that
cunning nest of hers, with the four mot
tied eggs in it, to the bank where the
humble bee buried out from some hole
behind the broad dock leaves" into
which he did not find his way.
A born naturalist; from childhood his
most eagerly desired outing was an ex-
cursion for eggs or for beetles, or
search for some rare flower or stone.
Added to this taste, as "Jim" grew older,
he passionately loved the sea, and was
never 80 happy as on the deck OF a yacht,
flying over the foam-tipped waves be-
fore merry breeze. One feature of the
boys life was the heart he put into every
pursuit, throwing his whole self into
whatever he undertook, and doing this
so enthusiastically that he always became
leader. During his boyhood, and later,
when youth at Oxford, people often
found themselves in full career after
something about which personally they
had been Indifferent, simply because Jim
Harrington had set his heart on that
particular object and had drawn his
friends into it.
Harrington entered Oxford at twenty
one, not having had the advantage of
public school training. His education
had been conducted in an irregular man.
ner, partly by tutors and partly in pri-
vate schools; and during his university
life he was handicapped by the lack of
70L21A WL1Ch OOJ6 tCCOtfO az 6uCA pldOO6
as Eson, Harrow and Rugby. But while
retarded in his course by this circum-
stance, he held his own bravely IL some
other lines.
haven't room to tell you how he wac
captain of boats crew, and pulled in
the thrilling holly contested boat races
of the colleges, the river and its banks
alive with spectators who held their
breath as the rowers bent to their work,
nor of the hairbreadth escapes, the dar-
ing entrance into caves with the tide
rushing after the explorer through
narrow gateway in the rocks, nor of the
climbing wild and rugged cliffs for the
eggs of the sea-mew. Such things as
these, hundreds OF brave Englishmen
have done once and again, with no claim
to be called heroes.
Harrington entered the church, and
became interested as his way was heart
and soul in the work of his calling. He
was thirty four years old when he felt it
his duty to offer himself to the Church
Missionary Society for service in Africa.
Life at home was full OF happiness, but
the inner voice would give him no rest
So one day it came to pass that he bade
good-by to his beautiful parish church,
his brave wife and three little children,
that he might spend from three to five
years in the land of Uganda which Stan
ley's explorations have made known to
the civilized world.
e The man who goes to Central Africa
must be prepared to face dangers of
every description. There is, first of all
the deadly fever, which pounces upon
the unacclimated like tiger springing
out of his ambush. Then, not to men,
ton the lions and other wild beasts.
there are the natives, ignorant, treacher-
GUS and cowardly. There is little to
tempt the imagination in campaign
among the morasses and jungles of At
RIGA; yet Huntington wrote it down as
his conviction that the blacks compared
very tsvorably with our own heather an
cestors.
Jim" Harrington "Uncle JIM" in
those days to troop OF nephews and
nieces, "papa" to the little trio at Hurst
found time to write long letters to the
children at home, illustrating the same
with clever pen randi ink sketches which
we're very droll.
He describes his first appearance
among the Wa gogs-people who had
never seen white men until Hannington's
party came among them. The men we're
nearly naked, their bodies smeared with
red ochre, sort of goat skin over the
shoulders their only covering. The wo-
men wore rather more clothing and we're
decorated with chains of copper and iron.
"Fancy," writes the missionary to his
young people at home, "a set of hideous,
grinning savages regarding your uncle
as a strange, outlandish creature, fright
fUl to behold. Are those your feet,
white man?' No, gentleman they are my
sandals.' But do they grow to your
feetT A roar of establishment follows
when they see the shoe coming of, re-